Full Citation
Title: The Long-Run Effect of Losing the Civil War: Evidence from Border States
Citation Type: Miscellaneous
Publication Year: 2014
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Abstract: This paper provides the first estimates of the long-term individual effects of serving on the losing side of the American Civil War on migration, health, and occupational outcomes. We compare men who served in the Confederate Army with their men who served in the Union army in the border state of Kentucky, which contributed significant numbers of soldiers to both armies. To create the dataset, we collected the universe of existing Union and Confederate enlistees from Kentucky and matched men to their pre- and post- war occupations and place of residence using the 1860 and 1880 censuses. Our findings show that Confederate soldiers were positively selected from Kentucky population prior to the onset of the conflict. We demonstrate strikingly different postwar migration patterns between Union and Confederate veterans and show how leaving Kentucky erased the socioeconomic disadvantage faced by Union veterans. Our results suggest that the decision to serve on the Union or Confederate side created lasting social divisions between otherwise similar men, and that these divisions had diverse economic consequences.
Url: http://economics.yale.edu/sites/default/files/elisalisburyshertzer2014.pdf
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Authors: Eli, Shari; Salisbury, Laura; Shertzer, Allison
Publisher: Yale University
Data Collections: IPUMS USA
Topics: Labor Force and Occupational Structure, Migration and Immigration, Other
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